US walks out of UN meeting amid criticism of America’s human rights record

Edith M Lederer, Associated Press

US diplomats walked out as their French counterparts were speaking at the United Nations on Monday after America’s close European ally criticised the Trump administration’s human rights record.

The surprise move during a UN Security Council meeting on Ukraine followed US opposition to giving UN human rights chief Volker Turk another four-year term.

The reappointment on Friday got overwhelming support, including from France.

The US walkout reflects not only the more strained relations between President Donald Trump and his French counterpart, Emmanuel Macron, but also wider tensions between the US and Europe.

These include questions over Mr Trump’s commitment to Nato, possible changes to US troop deployments in Europe, and Mr Trump’s desire to control Greenland, which belongs to Nato member Denmark.

Mr Trump has complained that Europeans, who were not consulted, did not help the US during the Iran war.

Amid the tensions, Mr Macron has taken a lead in trying to build up Europe’s military and ensure a nuclear umbrella as one of the continent’s two nuclear powers, along with Britain.

After Monday’s brief walkout, deputy US ambassador Dan Negrea accused France of feigning “moral outrage” and pretending to lecture the world about every topic, including human rights.

The United States has stood by France in every conflict where its “freedom has been imperiled” and tolerated its grandstanding “out of a sense of camaraderie and mutual respect”, he said, but no more.

What sparked the walkout was a social media post on Friday from France’s UN Mission in Geneva criticising US opposition to a second term for the UN rights chief.

The General Assembly voted 144-10 with 13 abstentions in support of Mr Turk, with the US among the “no” votes.

“The US used to be a beacon of human rights. Not anymore. Today, it stands alongside North Korea, Nicaragua, Mali and Russia, isolated. And the world no longer listens to it,” the French Mission tweeted.

Mike Waltz, the US ambassador to the UN, in responding on X, accused France of coddling ”some of the worst human rights abusers” and voting “for someone who has been lecturing, free, sovereign democracies like the United States, the UK, and Israel, while cozying up to the world’s worst oppressors”.

Mr Turk’s job as the UN rights chief, by its nature, is tricky: It requires speaking out against rights violations by the governments of the countries that make up the membership of the world body.

For instance, Mr Turk has sharply criticised Russia’s 2022 invasion of Ukraine and Israel’s war in Gaza as well as having urged a “massive rethink” of US immigration policy before the World Cup, citing issues around “racial profiling, surveillance and immigration enforcement”.

At Monday’s meeting, Mr Negrea drilled in on France.

“Today, I remind them that it is the United States that remains the beacon of liberty for the world,” he said.

“As such, we will not be affording them the benefit of listening to their politicised drivel until they renounce their condescending and disrespectful rhetoric and behave in a manner commensurate with their seat on this council.”

Independence

France’s UN ambassador Jerome Bonnafont never mentioned the walkout when asked to take the floor at the end of the council meeting to respond.

Instead, he noted that France — which helped the United States gain its independence — took part in the July 4 celebration of America’s 250th anniversary.

“The United Nations was created with the goal of working towards international peace and security, human rights and development,” he said.

“All of that forms the spirit in which France works within the United Nations … to preserve this institution, its independence, its ability to act in service of the charter and act to serve human rights and peace.”

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